Online business owners have various key decisions to make, and one of the most crucial ones is how expansive their products or services should be. Is it better to stick to a focused niche and perfect that? Or would it be more beneficial to expand as much as possible to appeal to a broad customer base?
There are advantages to both methods. However, in the modern age of internet business, it could be that the latter option is what’s going to provide the greatest chance of longevity for businesses.
Big Brands Diversify to Appeal to Mass Audiences
In the modern internet age, users are becoming accustomed to visiting sites and platforms and finding a vast selection of choices all in one place. This is particularly true in the entertainment industry, where sites like Netflix are desperately doing everything they can to make users stay on the platform for longer. Along with films and movies in numerous genres, the subscription service that started it all now offers games.
Elsewhere in the entertainment industry, online casinos are doing the same thing. Rather than simply offering slot games and tables, there are now Hot Drop Jackpots, video poker games, and specialty games like Thunder Crash, Amazonia Bingo and Keno Draw. When you play in your online casino for real money, you’ll find these games, along with plenty of other options. For example, you can also bet on sports, live dealer games, and horse racing all at the same site.
The reason for this mass diversification is so that these brands can appeal to as many people as possible. They are fishing with a huge net, and it has proven a great method for getting custom. However, it must be remembered that all these sites started off small and then gradually got to where they are today. Business owners that want to replicate their success need to adopt this slow approach as well.
Starting off With a Focused Niche is Crucial
It can be tempting for business owners to look at these success stories and then attempt to replicate them swiftly. However, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and this is a maxim that people would be wise to repeat in any industry. Jeff Bezos may be one of the richest men in the world now, but don’t forget that he started selling books out of his garage before Amazon became the behemoth it is today.
Whatever industry you find yourself in, it’s important to develop a clear concept for your brand in the early days. For Amazon, the company mastered selling books before it moved on to other things. Facebook began as an exclusive service for universities in the USA prior to its global domination.
If you start with a focused niche, you can easily pin down your target audience and zone in on attracting them. This can be done through detailed market research to find out exactly what they want and how they want it to be presented to them.
Once you have a loyal customer base, you can then continue compiling data on them to discover what their other needs are. This will give you the information you need about the best ways to expand. When you have more offerings in your business, you can appeal to different demographics. After finding themselves drawn to your site, customers will then explore the other options available.
It is arguably more important than ever for businesses to offer a wide range of services, as this is commonplace among the top sites online. However, the crucial thing to remember is that this expansion takes time, and it needs to come after you’ve mastered a focused niche.
